(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to disk drive apparatuses, and more particularly to a disk drive apparatus in which a disk cartridge is inserted into the inside of the apparatus and placed at a recording/reproducing position, and the disk cartridge is ejected by an ejection mechanism from the inside of the apparatus to an outside position.
(2) Description of the Prior Art
In a magnetic disk drive device, an ejection mechanism including a holder, a slider and a latch lever is provided. A disk cartridge accommodating a flexible magnetic disk is inserted in the holder. The latch lever actuated by a spring is connected to the slider before the disk cartridge is inserted. Upon insertion of the disk cartridge in the holder, the leading edge of the cartridge comes into contact with the latch lever, thus releasing the latch lever from the slider. The slider is moved so as to place the disk cartridge at a recording/reproducing position where information can be written to and read from the disk by means of a magnetic head of the disk drive device.
When an ejection button on a front bezel of the disk drive device is depressed by an operator, the slider is moved so as to rotate the latch lever due to the actuating force of the spring. As the latch lever is rotated so as to be connected to the slider, the disk cartridge is moved to an ejecting direction and then ejected from the holder.
In a different disk drive device, a shutter lever drawn by a spring is mounted on the holder such that the shutter of the disk cartridge is opened by the shutter lever after the insertion of the disk cartridge. In this disk drive device, when the ejection button is depressed by an operator, the shutter lever is rotated due to the drawing force of the spring at the same time as the latch lever is rotated to be connected to the slider, so that the disk cartridge is ejected from the holder by the latch lever and the shutter lever.
Generally, it is desirable that the disk cartridge always stops at a prescribed outside position after it is ejected from the holder. At the prescribed outside position, the rear edge of the cartridge is 30-40 mm distant from the front bezel of the disk drive device. If the distance between the cartridge edge and the front bezel after the ejection is smaller than 30 mm, an operator cannot easily take out the disk cartridge using the fingers. If the distance between the cartridge edge and the front bezel after the ejection is greater than 40 mm, it is likely that the disk cartridge will drop from an insertion opening of the front bezel.
In the disk drive devices mentioned above, the resilient forces of the latch lever spring and the shutter lever spring are preset to a relatively great level such that the displacement of the disk cartridge when it is ejected is greater than the movement of the shutter lever (or the movement of the latch lever) in the ejecting direction. Thus, the disk cartridge is further moved beyond the intended outside position in the ejecting direction after it is ejected outside the device, due to the resilient forces of the latch lever spring and the shutter lever spring.
However, in the above mentioned disk drive devices, the latch lever spring and the shutter lever spring have various resilient forces, and the frictional resistance between the cartridge and the holder varies. The ejection position to which the disk cartridge is ejected from the inside of the device is often different from the intended outside position. Occasionally, the disk cartridge leaps out or drops from the insertion opening due to the variation of the spring forces. After extended use of the disk drive device, the spring forces vary and the frictional resistance of the cartridge and the holder varies. Thus, in the conventional disk drive devices, it is difficult to smoothly and stably eject the disk cartridge to the intended outside position.